Bec's Happybox

Jam, Podcast

Sahsez was home sick yesterday and, as a result, I didn't leave the house all day.  By the time Tobias got home from work at 6:30, I was feeling distinctly nonhuman.  Not that it was a bad day.  Just one of those days where you feel like you are completely out of touch with the outside world.  I had a lot of them when I was working on the film last fall.  Also in the summer of '04 when I was doing a group project for my Bioinformatics class.  In both cases, the results were worth the surreally long and intense days.

So what did we do all day?  Well, I think it's obvious.  If your nearly-seven-year-old is home sick from school, but not so sick that she needs to lie in bed, you make jam and a podcast.  Blackberry jam and a podcast about kids' books.  The blackberries were a surprise find in the freezer (5 pounds!) and the podcast has been in the works for a while, ever since Sahsez discovered a great podcast for children (they are only a few!) called Dallas Amazing Kids and realized "Hey, I could do that!"

I'm not yet sure if we made the podcast just as a part of our own family audio scrapbook, or if we're actually going to have a real weekly podcast.  I am really excited about the idea of Sahsez doing a weekly podcast about what she's reading, and I think it would be such a fun activity for her.  But she can be shy at times, and I think I'm going to wait until she's done, say, three of them, consistently, on a weekly basis, before I actually make it a real iTunes podcast.  Also, I should say, even though I personally really like the one we did yesterday, I do think it will only appeal to the under-ten set, and this is our target audience.  I think it would be neat if she just made it for her school friends, and maybe even got one or two of them involved in it during the summer.  We'll see. 

Christening the Beast

About a month ago, Tobias and I co-bought a camperized van with my dad.  This plan has been in the works for a while, and my dad (who really was the driving force behind the thing) finally found something fitting his criteria (1. must be a van, 2. must be a "bargoon").  Here she is, in all her camperized glory:

New Recipes Numbers 43-49

100 New Recipes is not only a good way to encourage oneself to make new things, it's also, I hope, a good blogging warm-up exercise.  I'm not feeling terribly inspired lately, but I hope that starting out with some easy recipe blogging will get the juices flowing!  We'll see.

Anyway...

New Recipe Number 43: BBQ'd Asparagus - I found this recipe via Lex Culinaria's Summer BBQ Challenge blogging event, which I had intended to participate in, but missed the date.  It was really delicious.  This is hands-down my favourite way to eat asparagus now. I served it with swiss chard quiche, but I'm itching to try Ruth's entire Simple Spring to Summer Menu, which looks great.  Just need to get my hands on a cedar plank.

New Recipe Number 44: Rigatoni With Goat Cheese Sun Dried Tomatoes And Kale - Pretty good! But wouldn't you know it, just as I'm really hitting my stride with finding good ways to use up my fresh harvest box's chard, kale, and sunchokes every other week, Spud stops including these items!  Now it's broccoli and potatoes. 

New Recipe Number 45: Stuffed Peppers - Tobias made this to accompany some more fish tacos on Saturday night.  He got the recipe from one of these little books I can't seem to stop collecting, despite the fact that the recipes in them are pretty hit-and-miss.  You can tell by the photo that the Irish one is my favourite because it's the most worn out.  I think the primary flaw with these recipes is that the flavours are just generally too small.  Too small for Mexican, Thai or Indian cooking, that is.  The Irish recipes taste right.   The peppers were from the Mexican one, obviously, and, as usual, not enough flavour. 

New Recipe Number 46: Mexican Hot Fudge Sundaes - A reader recipe from Bon Appetit.  Delicioso!

New Recipe Number 47: Chicken and dumplings - From the Joy.  If I thought I was going to have a hard time making it to 100 this year, I would count this as two, because the Joy has you make chicken fricasee, then add dumplings at the end, so it's really two new recipes.  But I don't think I'm going to have a hard time making it to 100, so I won't be a bore and count it as two.  This was pretty darn good, aside from the dumplings.  I thought it would be smart to make the dumplings before Tae Kwon-Do, then cook them afterward.  It wasn't!  They were hard and chewy!  Must try again and make the dumplings immediately before cooking. 

New Recipe Number 48: American Blue Cheese Dressing - From Delia Smith's Summer Collection, which I (don't tell the authorities!) borrowed from the library, then photocopied my favourites out of.  I hate using bottled salad dressing and make my own (read: force Tobias to whip up some of his awesome balsamic viniagrette) whenever possible.  But I do love blue-cheese dressing and have never made that myself. 

This was a good one, but next time I will use less garlic.  This is probably the strongest-tasting dressing I've ever tried.  Ah look!  It's online!  Lucky you. I recommend <1 clove of garlic, but I guess it depends on how large your garlic is.  Mine is largish.  Hmm, I wonder why hers turned out so white.  With 1T of balsamic, mine was a lot browner. 

New Recipe Number 49: Hot Pork Curry - Tobias is still on his curry kick.  He seeks the perfect curry-at-home recipe.  Suggestions are welcome.  We're talking Indian curry here, but I am also open to ideas re: Thai green curries, which are my personal quest.  This pork curry, despite its tamarind concentrate and cardamom pods, was not the winner.  It was also from one of the books pictured above, and had the same flaw as the peppers: not enough oomph.   

Yo no soy marinero. Soy capitan!

My uncle's girlfriend sent this outfit from Nicaragua. Now don't call Child Protective Services. I'm not taking him out in public with it on.

Things that are Growing

M'hijo, Obviously

Ever since I posted about how he hadn't done anything yet, he started doing things.  He now grabs everything in sight, all the time.  If I put his soother in my mouth, he will take it out of my mouth and put it into his mouth.  He grabs my face to gives me kisses.  He grabs toys and stuffed animals and pens;  people's hair and earrings; blankets.  And everything goes in his mouth.  My dad likes to nod his head sagely and say "Oral obsession." 

And look, he can even stand now!  (Not really). 

Miracle Gro (TM) Basil

As I was telling Jessie, I have little luck growing basil.  I have killed more basil plants than I care to admit.  Yet I keep buying new ones, in the hopes that somehow, magically, my luck will improve.  Last week, I started a little experiment.  I planted two basil plants in terracotta pots on my kitchen windowsill, putting Miracle Gro in just one of the pots.  After a week, they look remarkably different.  I will now put some Miracle Gro in the ones I planted outside.  (As you see, I am not an organic gardener).

The sparrow babies

I first realized that the sparrow babies had hatched when I hit my head on the birdhouse last Thursday and they starting chirping their cute, teeny little chirps.  I made everyone stand under the house and listen to them.  Like M'hijo, whose adorable gurgling and cooing has morphed into a sometimes-annoying shriek, the baby sparrows now fill the backyard with a cacophony that can be very distracting!  Especially if one is cramming for a book club meeting in 48 hours.   

The grass

I swear my lawn requires a minimum of twice-weekly cutting this time of year.  Unfortunately, it doesn't get twice-weekly cutting.  So when we do cut it, it takes forever, and the result in not so good.  My neighbour honestly believes that women are incapable of properly cutting grass, which is false, but he might be right about weedeating.  I recently tried my hand at it, and I suck.  I did the worst hack job on the edging in the front yard, and I am afraid to take the weedeater to the back, which is so much prettier.  Damn grass. 

And one thing that is Shrinking: ME!

Today I reached my pre-pregnancy weight.  Oh happy day.  Now for some clothes shopping. 

New Recipes 41-42

New Recipe Number 41: Rhubarb and Cornmeal Cake - This is from my favourite baking book, Nigella Lawson's How to Be a Domestic Goddess, but you can find it online here.  It was very easy to make and tastes pretty much exactly how you would expect a rhubarb and cornmeal cake to taste: sort of like a gigantic corn muffin, sweet rather than savoury, and with hunks of rhubarb in it.  I liked it!  I have enough rhubarb for one more treat, I think, and then that's it for the this year's harvest. 

New Recipe Number 42: Halibut Fish Tacos with Guacamole Sauce - I am mad about fish tacos and would live in San Diego just to eat them if I didn't enjoy trying all sorts of different recipes for them at home even more than eating them in restaurants.   We get halibut from my in-laws from time to time when they are gifted with some from one of several fishermen in their lives.  Fresh is greatest, but frozen quick after catching is none too shabby.  I chose the Rachael Ray recipe (linked above) last night because it was touted as a 30-minute meal and, as usual, it was 7:30 on Sunday and I hadn't started getting supper together.  I ignored, somewhat, her guacamole recipe, since it lacked cilantro and fresh jalapeno, which I find essential, and contained tomatoes, which I find superfluous.  I did use the yogurt, however, which was kind of good!  Overall, the tacos were nice, but I really want to try fish tacos made this way.  Gotta get my hands on some shark filet. 

Counting down to Summer

Lately, to encourage Sahsez to wake up on Monday mornings, I've been counting down the number of weeks of school she has left before her summer break.  So this morning, for example, I said "Time to get up sleepyhead!  Just six weeks left before eight weeks off!"  This doesn't necessarily make her get out of bed any quicker, but she does like being reminded that her holiday is approaching.

Sahsez is looking forward to summer vacation a lot.  I'm not sure what to make of this, but I think I will choose to be glad that she likes to spend time with her brother and I rather than wring my hands about her not loving school more.  She likes it enough not to dislike it, and that will have to be enough for now, I suppose. 

As for summer plans, we have none.  We are planning a fall vacation (more on that soon), so the eight weeks of summer are pretty wide open.  Should be quite nice.  Sahsez stridently resists my suggestions that she try some new summer daycamps.  I don't know why I keep suggesting them, since I am supposed to be so opposed to the overscheduling of kids' non-school time.  I agree with my yoga instructor Helga that boredom for kids is not a bad thing.  Of summer vacations, she said, "My kids used to complain that they were bored in the summer time and I said 'Be bored!   Sit with your boredom.  Be in your boredom and see what happens.' "  I am down with that, and yet, when I read about all the cool camps, especially the art and theatre camps, I get all starry-eyed. 

Another parent I know thinks the summertime should be reserved for kids to relax and to do household chores.  I am down with that too.  Did I mention that Sahsez quite enjoys housework ("Mommy, can I PLEASE clean the toilet?"  "Oh, alright.") under the right conditions?  I'd like to nurture that.

Sahsez is returning to the science camp she attended last summer, and even asked to go for two weeks instead of one, so she's not entirely unambitious.  I once again lost the battle with the heathen Tobias regarding her attending any church daycamps.  I find this unreasonable.  Two weeks of science camp, seven hours a day, but not one week of church camp, three measly hours a day?  Not even when I'm teaching at the camp?  "No!" says the heathen Tobias.  Fine then! 

Another thing: summer camps are damned expensive.  Staying home and goofing off is free.  Aside from the obligatory gelatos bought on the way down to the beach, of course.

New Recipes 35-40

New Recipe Number 35: Strawberry and Rhubarb pie with a cream cheese crust - This is the one we had for M'hijo's four month celebration, and I forgot to record it earlier.  The strawberries were the last of the 2002 harvest from the freezer.  "But you didn't live in the yellow house in 2002!  You lived in family housing and had no garden!" says the astute and longtime reader.  True!  But when we moved into the house, the former owners left behind a few treats, including a bottle of champagne and two glasses, and frozen rhubarb and strawberries from the garden.  Wasn't that sweet? 

Anyway, so the strawberries were frozen but the rhubarb was fresh from the ground.  I'm not the queen of pie pastry, but the cream cheese pastry recipe from the Joy is pretty foolproof.  No blind-baking though.  I'm of the mind that such a wet filling demands blind baking, but what do I know, really?  I'm still a novice at this pastry game. 

New Recipe Number 36: Marinated Cukes with Asian Flavour - From my favourite new food blog, Dirty Sugar Cookies by Ayun Halliday, whose zine, the East Village Inky, I've been reading and loving for years.  These were great, and I'd like to try them again and sprinkle some toasted sesame seeds over. 

New Recipe Number 37: Breaded pork chops - If doing 100 New Recipes has taught me anything, it's how much I rely on the All-New Joy of Cooking to help fill my family's bellies.  Tobias made the breaded pork chops from it on Saturday night, and man they were really tasty!  I usually buy Hutterite-raised meat from my butcher, but a few weeks ago, I broke down and ordered a big pack of pork chops from Thrifty's, and froze a few for future use.  So they were not the best-quality, and they had been frozen for several weeks, and the recipe was still great. 

New Recipe Numer 38: Mushroom gravy - In my opinion, it would make no sense to have breaded pork chops and not have mushroom gravy (and mashed potatoes).  I've never made one, but I just flew by the seat of my pants and it turned out delicious. 

Instructions

Make a roux (about  2T butter, 2T flour), cook it, then add about a cup of mushroom broth (I use Harvest Sun mushroom bouillon cubes).  Whisk, whisk, whisk, taste it.   Good but wrong colour.  Cheat with a litle Kitchen Bouquet.  Ah, now it's a nice dark brown.  Whisk, cook, let it thicken, yum.  Distract husband, discreetly pour in some Villa Antinori Toscana (or any white, or even red, I suppose, if you want, although I wouldn't) from your glass.  If he sees you putting good drinking wine in the gravy he will fuss.   Taste.  Could use even more wine.  Distract and pour again.  Now add all the sliced mushrooms that you can get your hands on and let it simmer on v, v, v low heat for oh, say, five minutes.  Make a well in the middle of your mashed potatoes and make your own little mushroom gravy volcano.  Dig in! 

New Recipe Number 39: Smothered sunchokes with tomatoes and onions - Well, I got more sunchokes in my Spud box, but I didn't want to do a gratin of any kind, so I went hunting for something different.  Apparently, Marcella Hazan is the world's biggest sunchoke fan, since her book, Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, has at least half a dozen sunchoke recipes in it, compared to all of my other cookbooks, which have around zero.   With this one, you just cook up some onions, garlic, tomato and parsley and add hunks of sunchoke and cook for a long time, and it turns out very tasty.  Can't wait to get more sunchokes!

New Recipe Number 40: Grilled Shrimp Skewers - Once I had Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking open last night, I figured I might as well cook my whole dinner from it.  So, loosely following Hazan's recipe,  I defrosted 15 big shrimp, stuck them on three skewers, and then pressed on a paste made from olive oil, garlic, parsley, and Breton crackers.  Tobias barbecued them for two minutes a side. They turned out pretty good, slightly chewy.  Would have been better with fresh shrimp.   

Fear me!

I'm not as vain as I once was (hard to be when your "beauty regimen" consists of sometimes washing your face with soap and usually brushing your teeth) but I've been resisting wearing a mouthguard during sparring for about eighteen months now, simply because I didn't want to look like an idiot. 

Well, recently, my club has cracked down on non-mouthguard-wearers, banning them from receiving and executing shots to the head.  And dude, without head shots, my whole sparring scenario sucks!  My signature move is the back fist to the side of the head.  Fakey front kick, then back fist.  That's all I can do, really.  So I was forced to get a mouthguard. 

And yes, I now look like an idiot.  But on the upside, last night's sparring class was tonnes of fun. 

To yog or not to yog? Not to yog

I've been hemming and hawing all week about whether I would return to my postnatal yoga class this week.  My initial fee covered eight classes over 11 weeks, and now that those are used up, I have the option to continue for another four classes over six weeks before my instructor packs it up for the summer.  (At right, M'hijo practices his reclining frog pose)

I have another 45 minutes to decide, but I'm 95% positive I won't be returning.  Which is not to say that I didn't love the class.  It was, in many ways, the best yoga class I've taken.  But I think it's outlived it's usefulness for me. At least, it's not so useful that I'm willing to give up most of my Tuesdays and ten bucks a shot for it. 

If you've never been to a postnatal yoga class, it can be a shock.   Imagine 20 postpartum women in a room, all bursting with chatter about their new experiences, many red-eyed from lack of sleep, but jittery from nonlack of coffee, most aching in at least three parts of their bodies.  Now picture their 20 babies with them, ranging in age from two weeks to eight months, some sitting up, playing with their toys and shrieking with laughter, others lying down and shrieking with hunger and rage.  Now picture about a hundred pounds of baby paraphrenalia (diaper bags, soothers, toys, blankets, stuffed animals, rattles) spread all over.  Now picture forty huge-with-milk breasts flashing about at all times.  Put it all together, add the calmest and most serene yoga instructor in the universe, and you've got my postnatal yoga class.  It can be a crazy environment to try to find some peace, but somehow it works.

I've been practicing yoga, on and off, for about ten years, and I really like the mind-body connection stuff.  But the really key part of this class for me was completely physical.  The poses and exercises we did were specifically geared toward the needs of a woman who has been pregnant for nine months, has laboured and given birth, and, perhaps most importantly, is now spending all her time carrying around a very heavy, sometimes squirming sack of sugar, and not always lifting with her legs.  I've had sore hip joints since last summer, and a sore back since February, and Tuesdays were the only days these pains went away, because of yoga.

But now, those aches and pains have abated somewhat, and I'm stretching at Tae-Kwon Do, which is helping, and mostly it's just really sunny out and I would rather plant my new hostas and weed and cut the grass than pack up M'hijo and ride the bus for 15 minutes then walk for another 15 to get to the yoga studio.

Yoga classes usually end with savasana, and relaxation, and sometimes a reading or a meditation.  Helga, my postnatal instructor, recognizes that new moms have neither the focussing power, nor the inclination, to listen to a long reading.  So she keeps it short and sweet.  My favourite one is something even the most frazzled and fatigued mama can grasp: "Life, for all its imperfections, is good."